What you’re looking for when you’re looking for a missing airplane

Four days after a Malaysia Airlines 777 jet and the 239 people aboard disappeared over the Gulf of Thailand, authorities haven’t found the plane or the cause of its disappearance.

Their search has eerie parallels to the search for Air France flight 447, the last airline to disappear in flight, over the Atlantic in 2009 en route to Brazil. Then as now, two passengers were thought to be connected to Islamic extremism before authorities dismissed such speculation.